OK, I’m going to call it: Threads is here to stay. After a record-breaking start, Threads is fast proving that it was no fly-by-night fad but a force to be reckoned with among the other social media giants. Threads by Instagram now has an estimated 160 million monthly active users and counting. To put that into perspective, that’s a little over a third of X’s (formerly Twitter) monthly active users of 550 million — and X has a good 16 years on Threads.  The platform bears a striking resemblance to X, but fans are quick to point out the community-building focus. Introducing a clever tags ..read more

“This year is going to be transformative!” As humans, we tend to say (and believe) this statement about every year. And it’s true – we don’t stay stagnant, and neither do the industries in which we work. But something about 2024 makes me think it stands poised to redefine the social media landscape and the creator economy.  As we dive into this new era fueled by changing consumer behavior, the influence of AI, and the shifting of how platforms function, certain key trends emerge, painting a picture of a different digital world. However, I’m not a trend forecaster or follower by any means ..read more

From the moment I started my company, Motif Skincare, I knew I was entering a crowded market with high customer acquisition costs. It would be challenging to compete with influencers and larger brands when it comes to fueling new customer discovery. As such, the primary goal was to create products that truly made a difference in people's routines—products they would discover and want to buy again and again—and to focus our marketing efforts on fostering that hyper-loyalty. This isn’t to say I don’t do any top-of-the-funnel marketing. We utilize many of the traditional growth channels: organic ..read more

It’s not the first time I’ve tried out LinkedIn Premium — but it is the first time I’m approaching the platform’s paid subscription as a creator.  While actively hunting for my new role in early 2023, I took advantage of the free trial of LinkedIn Premium, then extended it for another few months. As a job seeker, the benefits were great — the platform recommended jobs I would be a top applicant for and allowed me to reach out to hiring managers directly, even if I wasn’t connected to them. I didn’t end up as a content writer at Buffer because of LinkedIn (that was down to a fun ..read more

Buffer, as a company, closes the last week of the year every year, and historically, as an engineering team, we’d do a code freeze for the week before we’re closed so nothing broke heading into the holidays. (Pretty smart of us.)  This year, we did something different, and it still worked out. We used the last week of the year as a “fixathon” for our whole engineering team.  Fixathon = a week where our 29-person engineering team spent a whole week focused on fixing bugs.  By the end of the week, not only had we fixed 44 bugs, we also didn’t break anything in the process. ? &nbs ..read more

Inaccurate, packed with "filler," or completely AI-generated — bad B2B (business-to-business) content is easy to spot and even easier to find online. According to one study, it also costs over $50 billion annually due to wasted resources alone. But what makes B2B content good? Tough question. With Google promising to prioritize "helpful content" going into 2024 and studies showing that as little as 5 percent of all content assets generate 90 percent of customer engagement, helpful, engaging B2B content is a north star B2B marketing teams must strive for. Every seasoned B2B marketer has their ..read more

Like many small business owners, I spent a lot of time in 2023 considering how I wanted to integrate artificial intelligence into my content agency, iHartContent. At first, my instinct was to join “Team No AI” and to ignore it altogether. As a writer, the fear of tools like ChatGPT is entirely understandable. After all, it can spit out an entire blog post in mere moments. It’s natural to worry about being replaced.  But as I watched this emerging technology continue to evolve—and began to see the many ways founders in other industries were beginning to use it—I decided to instead take a ..read more

There is no new idea under the sun, which makes setting yourself apart from the competition quite hard. I faced this problem when I became a travel blogger and content creator.  I launched my travel blog in February 2020 with big plans, but we all know how that turned out. The pandemic hit literary one month later. So, not only was I joining a highly competitive travel industry, but it was at the worst possible time.  You’d think I would have pivoted to an industry less dependent on travel, like lifestyle or beauty, but I didn’t. Three years down the line, and I’m still going strong ..read more

There’s nothing like a shiny new year of possibilities to inspire content creation — and a wide-open social media calendar to go with it.  Now, don’t let all those open slots intimidate you. A great way to kickstart your 2024 content batch is to note down all the year's important official (and goofy, unofficial) holidays. Even if you slot them into your social calendar as a placeholder, you’re on the right track for now.  Doing so is essential for two reasons: It’s a great way to inspire fresh social media content ideas and fun or meaningful ways to connect with your target audienc ..read more

In November 2023, LinkedIn reached a huge milestone: it passed the one-billion-user mark. But only 1 percent of LinkedIn users actively publish content on the platform, meaning there’s still a lot of growth waiting to happen – and many potential followers to gather. I can personally attest to the power of focusing your creative efforts on LinkedIn, as my own account sits at over 11,000 followers as a result of consistent posting over the past 4 years. Building this following has helped me build credibility and get opportunities to work with some incredible companies and people. So, if you’ve ..read more